Coyote 1 "Schaumburg Female"

2000 to 2010

Coyote 1 was the first coyote captured on the project, on March 22, 2000, and has become the signature coyote of our research. When she was originally captured, she was just a year old and solitary. She weighed 13 kg (about 29 lbs), and was in excellent health, if not a little on the small side. In coyote years, she was a teenager. We tracked her movements over portions of five cities for the next nine months, as she floated across the landscape looking for a territory. Eventually, she settled down with an uncollared male during early 2001, and started the pack we refered to as the Meacham Pack. She was recaptured on April 12, 2004 (after months of trying on our part) as a mature, pregnant female. Again, she was in excellent health, weighing in at 37.5 lbs. She was an alpha female until her death in 2010, and we were fortunate to follow her every year as well as track many of her offspring (we were able to microchip 25 of her pups, covering six litters). Coyote 1 died of natural causes resulting from old age.

Coyote 1 in her older age

She was obviously very street smart, given that her territory covered many busy roads. She was once observed crossing eight lanes of traffic on I-290 when she was a subadult, and many researchers watched her and her mate cross roads regularly at night. Below is a map of her and her final mate's territory (coyote 115). Coyote 1 and coyote 115 lived in a heavily developed area within a few miles of O’Hare International Airport. In the first map below, yellow dots are locations of coyote 1 and red dots are locations of her mate, coyote 115. A sequence of maps tracks her over the years to help tell her story, with her locations covering much of the green space in this urban area.

One of seven pups from coyote 1 and 115’s litter in 2004

There was never any indication of human conflict with either animal.

Urban coyote stories

Coyote 441 is one of the most successful urban coyotes we have observed. This female was captured near the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago on March 10th, 2010. At the time of capture, she was a subadult in excellent condition, weighing 11 kg. A GPS collar was placed on her and we recorded her locations until November 2010 when her collar blew off (these collars are programmed to remotely fall off at a specified time).